Edited by Alessandro Riccioni
“Play is children’s art, art is grownups’ play. Happiness is not delivered by dreams but is born from the possibility to invent life in a poetic dimension. Some games lead nowhere, some games have no rules, they’re daydreaming. Play, like art, has strict rules and a machine that carries afar.”
Maria Lai, 1994
Art holds – and always held – an important place in humankind’s life. Without art, there would have likely been no evolution in the strictest sense of this term. Art, as it makes and acts, cultivates our deepest side and opens it to the world, to others, to life.
Art works just like games and, by its own nature, revitalises desire, dreams, fear – all “telluric” movements that dignify our lives as humans, not just biologic beings. Today many studies address art and the world of childhood. In their essays about the role of books about art, artists and art history, leading experts acknowledge that it is not just possible but even desirable to discuss with children about art, about the aesthetic experiences that made our world not only better-looking but even and above all fairer, freer and truer.
For this reason, the Distretto Biblioteche della Montagna Bolognese has set up a project titled “I mestieri dell’arte” engaging all schools in the participating municipalities. This project includes workshops with artists, invitations to read, a training course for librarians and teachers open to people from other areas.
Furthermore, in the context of a deep cooperation between municipalities and the mountain public libraries, even in the most peripheric areas an itinerant thematic exhibition will present to children and youths some of the most interesting international books on topic ‘art and childhood/youth’. The exhibition encompasses 3 sections: books about artists, artists’ books, books to make art. More than 50 beautiful and high-quality volumes will be available for consultation in the public libraries from December 2018 to June 2019.
